9 Best Firefox Extensions to Boost Your Workflow
Last updated on: November 24, 2023
Did you know that Firefox is the fourth most popular web browser in the world?
According to statistics, Firefox takes the fourth place in terms of browser market share right after Google Chrome, Safari, and Microsoft Edge browser.
Apart from being quite popular and easy to use, Firefox browser offers a wide range of extensions that you can use daily — both for work and personal use.
Whether you need an easy way to schedule social media posts or want to increase your productivity, Firefox extensions are a sure-fire solution.
To help you choose the right Firefox extension for your needs, in this blog post, we’ll:
- Give you the list of the best Firefox extensions you should try,
- Provide you with all the important details about these tools, such as their prices, pros and cons, and more, and
- Answer some of the frequently asked questions about the Firefox extensions.
![Best Firefox extensions - cover](jpg/best-firefox-extensions-cover.jpg)
Table of Contents
The best Firefox extensions for different business needs
Here are some of the best Firefox extensions you should install on your browser depending on your needs:
- Clockify — best for time tracking and increased productivity,
- Tree Style Tab — best for organizing your tabs,
- DownThemAll! — best for managing downloads,
- uBlock Origin — best for privacy protection and a better browser experience,
- Grammarly — best for grammar-checking,
- Turn Off the Lights — best for enhanced video viewing experience,
- Publer — best for social media scheduling,
- Bitwarden — best for managing passwords, and
- FireShot — best for capturing screenshots.
Clockify — best for time tracking and increased productivity
![Clockify screenshot](jpg/clockify-screenshot.jpg)
Clockify is a time tracking software used by millions. It lets you track work hours across projects.
Why is Clockify best for time tracking and increased productivity?
Clockify offers many options to help you record the time you spend on your tasks and projects.
With Clockify’s Firefox time tracking extension, you can:
- Track your time via timer or manually (using timesheets),
- Utilize reminders and idle detection alerts for more accurate time tracking, and
- Track your time by selecting any text in the browser (for example, an email subject in Gmail).
For example, I use Clockify’s timer to track how much time I spend on each project, which helps me plan and organize my workload more efficiently.
Apart from tracking my time with it, I also use Clockify’s Firefox extension to increase my productivity.
One of my favorite features that I can use with Clockify’s Firefox extension is the Pomodoro Timer. It allows me to work in regular work/break intervals using the Pomodoro technique.
![Clockify pomodoro timer](jpg/clockify-pomodoro-timer-1.jpg)
To be able to add minutes for time intervals and breaks, check the “Enable pomodoro timer” box in settings.
By using Clockify’s Pomodoro timer, you can eliminate burnout and increase your focus.
With Clockify’s Firefox time tracking extension, not only will you be able to track your time easily, but you’ll also become a more productive version of yourself.
💡Clockify Pro Tip
If you want to increase your productivity but aren’t sure where to start or which methods or tools to use, here are some helpful resources:
Clockify’s pros
These are some of the main benefits of using Clockify:
- It allows you to continue the timer for an activity with just one click (for an activity that’s already recorded in your timesheets),
- It offers the possibility of automatically stopping the timer at a specified time of the day, and
- It is extremely easy to set up and use.
Clockify’s cons
To see some of the main disadvantages of using Clockify, take a look at the list below:
- It doesn’t have an option of splitting a time entry into two with a single action,
- It doesn’t allow you to schedule multiple tasks on a timeline, and
- For additional time tracking features like the option to import timesheets from a file directly to Clockify, you’ll need to upgrade to one of the paid plans.
What’s new in Clockify
In October 2023, Clockify introduced some UX improvements to its users. These include removing the “Load more” button that users had to click to load projects/tags and implementing infinite scrolling which allows projects/tags to load as the user scrolls.
In the same month, Clockify also introduced updates for ClickUp integration. One of these updates includes the ability to pick up ClickUp’s task name and start tracking time for that task via timer.
These updates are all available in Google Chrome and Firefox extensions.
Apart from the Firefox extension, Clockify also offers several other platforms.
Type of plan and availability | Clockify pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | Yes |
Cheapest paid plan | $3.99/month/user (billed annually) |
Availability | Android, iOS, Web (Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge extensions), Mac, Windows, Linux |
Tree Style Tab — best for organizing your tabs
![Tree Style Tab screenshot](jpg/tree-style-tab-screenshot.jpg)
Tree Style Tab can easily become one of your favorite Firefox add-ons. It allows you to organize your tabs as “trees” and rearrange them according to your needs.
Why is Tree Style Tab best for organizing your tabs?
Tree Style Tab is an indispensable asset for anyone who has a tough time dealing with tab cluttering.
With Tree Style Tab’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Organize your tabs by creating Independent Tabs, Child Tabs, or Sibling Tabs,
- Use the “History” option to search for a specific page you’ve once opened, and
- Utilize the “Bookmarks” option to quickly find a specific page you’ve previously bookmarked.
Tree Style Tab can help you get a better overview of all your tabs, and it is also ideal if you want to organize your tabs by grouping them.
For example, I use Tree Style Tab to create “trees” where each tree reflects a group of tabs on the same topic. In other words, if I’m researching how to build a browser extension, for instance, but I’m also exploring different Firefox add-ons, I can create two tab-trees, one for each topic.
I also like using the Tree Style Tab’s “History” option. It allows me to quickly find a specific page by applying the “By Date and Site” filter, for example.
![Tree Style Tab history option](jpg/tree-style-tab-history-option.jpg)
If I need to find a specific page that I’ve opened in the last 7 days, I don’t have to waste time opening and scrolling down my browser history to find it. With Tree Style Tab, I can do it in the extension itself.
In addition, all tabs are neatly organized into folders, which makes the whole search process even easier.
Although Tree Style Tab doesn’t offer much functionality compared to some other similar extensions, it is still worth installing if you want a simple tab manager extension.
Tree Style Tab’s pros
Here are some key advantages of using Tree Style Tab:
- It allows you to rearrange your tabs by dragging and dropping them,
- It helps you keep track of different websites and pages as you switch between tasks, and
- It allows you to group your tabs for better organization.
Tree Style Tab’s cons
These are some of the disadvantages of using Tree Style Tab:
- It is scarce in features compared to some other similar extensions,
- It may take you a little longer to master all the settings, and
- Its UI design could be more aesthetically pleasing.
What’s new in Tree Style Tab
On the 10th of November 2023, Tree Style Tab released a new version of the extension with some updates.
These new updates include options like additional context menu commands “Mute/Unmute this Tree” and “Mute/Unmute Descendants” and more.
Type of plan and availability | Tree Style Tab pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | No |
Cheapest paid plan | No paid plans |
Availability | No other platforms |
DownThemAll! — best for managing downloads
![DownThemAll screenshot](jpg/downthemall-screenshot.jpg)
If you need a free download manager browser extension, DownThemAll! is the right solution for you.
Why is DownThemAll! best for managing downloads?
DownThemAll! makes managing and downloading a bunch of files a breeze.
With DownThemAll!’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Download all the links or media from a certain web page in one go,
- Choose specific links or media that you want to download from a certain web page, and
- Apply filters like GIF Images, Videos, Audio, and more to quickly organize and select the items you want to download.
What I especially like about DownThemAll! is that it also allows me to create a separate folder for the files that I downloaded using this extension.
By using the “Subfolder” option, I can create and name a subfolder and store all my downloads there.
![DownThemAll subfolder](jpg/downthemall-subfolder.jpg)
This new subfolder will be saved automatically in my Downloads folder.
With DownThemAll!, I can also pause, resume, and cancel downloads at any time, so I have complete control over the downloading process.
DownThemAll!’s pros
Here are some of the biggest advantages of DownThemAll!:
- It provides the “All Tabs” option to download links and media from all opened tabs simultaneously,
- It allows you to easily download a multitude of files at once and save time, and
- It offers customizable filters to organize and download the files you need at a given moment.
DownThemAll!’s cons
Let’s see some of the disadvantages of using DownThemAll!:
- It would be nice if you could see the images you want to download (in the form of a thumbnail, for example) and not just their links,
- The option of creating custom filters may be difficult to understand, and
- It doesn’t offer many functionalities.
What’s new in DownThemAll!
DownThemAll!’s most recent updates were presented to their users on August 23rd 2023, when DownThemAll!’s 4.11 version was released. One of these updates includes the ability to download the AVIF image format.
DownThemAll! is also available as an extension for Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge.
Type of plan and availability | DownThemAll! pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | No |
Cheapest paid plan | No paid plans |
Availability | Web (Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge extensions) |
uBlock Origin — best for privacy protection and a better browser experience
![uBlock Origin screenshot](jpg/ublock-origin-screenshot.jpg)
The uBlock Origin is an efficient blocker add-on that can help you block ads, trackers, and more.
Why is uBlock Origin best for privacy protection and a better browser experience?
The uBlock Origin has all the necessary options a great privacy extension may offer and more.
With uBlock Origin’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Block unwanted ads, large media elements, or remote fonts (fonts from external servers) on certain websites,
- Remove page elements such as disturbing images you may encounter on some pages, for example, and
- Prevent tracking and malicious advertising of third-party advertisers to protect your privacy.
With uBlock Origin, you don’t have to worry about malicious or intrusive ads and pop-ups that spoil your browsing experience. You can simply block them and continue using the browser without such interruptions.
You can also set custom settings for each website you visit.
For example, if I want to block large media elements on a particular website to potentially speed up the loading of the page I’m currently on, I can do so with uBlock Origin. I just need to click the film button.
![uBlock Origin blocking large media elements](jpg/ublock-origin-blocking-large-media-elements.jpg)
These settings will apply to all pages of that website. Moreover, these settings are temporary by default.
However, I can also make these settings permanent by clicking on the padlock icon.
For even greater control over my browsing experience, I also use the uBlock Origin’s “Trusted sites” option. With it, I can add the URLs of specific websites and completely disable uBlock Origin while I’m on them.
uBlock Origin’s pros
To see some of the good sides of using uBlock Origin, read the list below:
- It allows you to temporarily or permanently block irrelevant or disturbing content by removing certain page elements,
- It helps you protect your online privacy by blocking malicious ads from third-party advertisers, and
- It is free of charge.
uBlock Origin’s cons
Here are some of the uBlock Origin’s disadvantages:
- Some features require advanced technical knowledge,
- Sometimes, it can take a while until the extension accepts changes, and
- It doesn’t offer many other platforms.
What’s new in uBlock Origin
On October 31st, 2023, uBlock Origin introduced a number of fixes/changes when it released its latest 1.53.0 version.
Some of these fixes/changes include setting “My Filters” as an untrusted source by default for increased security. This was done because a number of users utilized the copy-paste option carelessly, which potentially can cause a security breach.
In addition to the Firefox extension, uBlock Origin is also available as an extension for other web browsers.
Type of plan and availability | uBlock Origin pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | No |
Cheapest paid plan | No paid plans |
Availability | Web (Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Opera extensions) |
Grammarly — best for grammar-checking
![Grammarly screenshot](jpg/grammarly-screenshot.jpg)
Grammarly is an intuitive tool that checks your grammar, spelling, and more as you write. Once you install this browser, you’ll be able to use it on most websites that have text fields, and it runs automatically.
Why is Grammarly best for grammar-checking?
Grammarly helps you improve your writing skills by allowing you to:
- Check your grammar, spelling, and punctuation,
- Adjust your tone,
- Write concise and clear sentences, and
- Find the most appropriate words for a given context.
With Grammarly, you can write high-quality text and save time on editing and polishing.
As I often write, whether for work or for other occasions, I use Grammarly to improve my writing skills and solve any grammar doubts that I might have.
What I particularly like about Grammarly is its “Synonyms” option. This option comes in handy when I want to check if there’s another similar but perhaps more suitable word that I can use in a particular sentence.
![Grammarly synonyms option](jpg/grammarly-synonyms-option.jpg)
As soon as I double-click on a word, various synonyms of the given word and their definitions automatically appear in the window.
Another interesting Grammarly’s option is its “Personal Dictionary.” I use this feature to add new words that do not exist in the Grammarly’s dictionary. That way, I can stop Grammarly from flagging those words as “misspelled” or “unknown.”
For example, if I’m writing about a productivity tool named “Productivus”, to prevent Grammarly from treating this word as a misspelling, I can simply add it to the Personal Dictionary.
![Grammarly personal dictionary](png/grammarly-personal-dictionary.png)
Grammarly also detects plagiarism in your text, which is another feature that might be useful to many — from writers and researchers to students.
💡Clockify Pro Tip
If you’re a student and you’re interested in seeing which Chrome extensions you can use for better studying, higher productivity, quicker research, and more, don’t forget to read the blog post below:
Grammarly’s pros
Here are some of the main advantages of using Grammarly:
- It offers phrasal autocomplete on Gmail, Yahoo Mail, and the web version of Outlook,
- It helps you improve your writing skills and easily check your grammar, spelling, and more, and
- It allows you to add new words to the Personal Dictionary and stop them from being flagged as misspelled words.
Grammarly’s cons
Let’s see some of the biggest downsides of using Grammarly:
- Its paid plans may be too expensive for some users,
- Its free plan is limited in features, and
- It doesn’t work when you’re offline.
What’s new in Grammarly
In the summer of 2023, Grammarly released several product updates — some available in the free plan and others in the paid plans.
When it comes to paid plans’ updates, one of them is the option of shortening your text and adjusting its tone to ensure you sound more on-brand.
For a free plan, Grammarly added the “Rewrite” option for users who want to improve their writing with the help of higher-quality rewrites.
Apart from the Firefox extension, Grammarly also offers many other platforms.
Type of plan and availability | Grammarly pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | Yes |
Cheapest paid plan | $12/month if billed annually |
Availability | Android, iOS, Web (Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, and Safari extensions), Mac, Windows |
Turn Off the Lights — best for enhanced video viewing experience
![Turn Off the Lights screenshot](jpg/turn-off-the-lights-screenshot.jpg)
If you’re looking for a browser extension that allows you to watch videos more comfortably, Turn Off the Lights might be the ideal extension for you.
Why is Turn Off the Lights best for enhanced video viewing experience?
Turn Off the Lights offers many options to help you fully enjoy watching videos.
With Turn Off the Lights’ Firefox extension, you can:
- Highlight the video player you use to watch videos and darken the rest of the web page for a more cinematic viewing experience,
- Use the “Atmosphere Lighting” option to generate light effects around the video player and make the video more vivid, and
- Optimize the video you’re watching by adjusting its brightness, contrast, saturation, and more.
With Turn Off the Lights, I can fully immerse myself in the video I’m watching. By highlighting the video itself and dimming the rest of the web page, I can eliminate distractions from surrounding content.
One of the main reasons why I like this extension is its various background options.
For example, if I want to focus even more on a video, I can simply blur out the rest of the web page. In addition, I can also choose a background image or a dynamic background, depending on my needs.
![Turn Off the Lights background option](jpg/turn-off-the-lights-background-option.jpg)
Furthermore, if I want to use a specific image for my background, I can do that too. I just need to add that image’s URL in the Turn Off the Lights’ settings.
![Turn Off the Lights adding image url](jpg/turn-off-the-lights-adding-image-url.jpg)
Turn Off the Lights is especially useful for people who work at night and watch a lot of videos for research, for example. It gives them a better viewing experience and protects their vision with the “Eye Protection” capabilities.
💡Clockify Pro Tip
Are you one of those people who like to work at night? Do you feel like you are more productive late at night compared to when you work during the day? Well, you may be a night owl — an interesting phenomenon you can learn more about in the following blog post:
Turn Off the Lights’ pros
These are some of Turn Off the Lights’ key advantages:
- It helps you focus on the video you’re watching by highlighting it,
- It allows you to create light effects around the video player and make the video you’re watching more vivid, and
- It offers the option to adjust the brightness, contrast, or saturation of the video to optimize it according to your preferences.
Turn Off the Lights’ cons
Here are some of the bad sides of using Turn Off the Lights:
- It can show bugs when you want to apply certain settings,
- It took me a while to find the Options page (you need to take several steps to access it), and
- It offers email support only.
What’s new in Turn Off the Lights
On September 19th 2023, Turn Off the Lights announced a major update known as Manifest V3 for Turn Off the Lights’s Firefox extension users.
Manifest V3 offered the speedier performance of the extension and enhanced security for better online privacy.
Besides being available as a Firefox extension, Turn Off the Lights also offers many other platforms.
Type of plan and availability | Turn Off the Lights pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | No |
Cheapest paid plan | No paid plans |
Availability | Android, iOS, Web (Google Chrome, Firefox, Opera, Microsoft Edge, Brave, Vivaldi, Cốc Cốc, Naver Whale, Samsung Internet, and Safari extensions), Mac, Windows, Linux |
Publer — best for social media scheduling
![Publer screenshot](jpg/publer-screenshot.jpg)
Publer is a Firefox add-on that can help you create and schedule social media posts in an easy and efficient way.
Why is Publer best for social media scheduling?
Publer is a perfect tool for those who need to manage content on various social media platforms.
With Publer’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Create and share posts across all major social networks,
- Use the “Calendar” option to schedule your posts,
- Utilize the “Bulk” option to save time and schedule up to 500 posts at once, and
- Customize each post according to your preferences by adding media, hashtags, location, and more.
With Publer, you cannot only create posts, but you can also recycle certain posts by reposting them.
In addition, you can also schedule recurring posts, which is one of my favorite Publer’s options.
To schedule a recurring post, all I have to do is:
- Click on the “Recurring” option,
- Specify the recurring frequency of the post (for example, once a week),
- Choose the duration for the post to recur (that is, select a start and end date), and
- Set a specific time when I want that post to recur.
You can see how I use Publer to schedule recurring posts for my LinkedIn profile in the screenshot below.
![Publer recurring option](jpg/publer-recurring-option.jpg)
Another amazing Publer’s scheduling option that I use is the “AutoSchedule” option. With it, I can set up a posting schedule and let Publer publish posts according to that schedule.
Publer also offers powerful analytics for in-depth social media post analysis. However, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid plan to be able to use it.
Publer’s pros
Let’s see some of the main benefits of using Publer below:
- It offers the “Post preview” option that allows you to see how your post would look like once you shared it,
- It allows you to easily schedule posts using different options like manual scheduling, automatic scheduling, or the recurring schedule option, and
- It helps you schedule posts in bulk and save time.
Publer’s cons
Here are some of Publer’s key disadvantages:
- To be able to use Publer’s analytics, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid plan,
- It may be expensive for some users who want to share posts on a large number of social accounts, and
- It offers email and chat support only.
What’s new in Publer
In February 2023, Publer introduced the AI assist feature to their users. This feature helps them generate content in seconds.
The most recent update — the ability to schedule Facebook Stories with Publer — was announced on November 13th 2023.
These new updates apply to all their platforms.
Apart from the Firefox extension, Publer is also available as an extension for Google Chrome, Safari, and Microsoft Edge and as a mobile app.
Type of plan and availability | Publer pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | Yes |
Cheapest paid plan | $12.00/month/member (with a minimum of 3 social accounts and 0 additional members) |
Availability | Android, iOS, Web (Google Chrome, Safari, and Microsoft Edge extensions) |
Bitwarden — best for managing passwords
![Bitwarden screenshot](jpg/bitwarden-screenshot.jpg)
Bitwarden is a password manager trusted by millions. With it, you can manage, store, and share passwords across devices from anywhere.
Why is Bitwarden best for managing passwords?
Bitwarden offers a lot of options regarding password management.
With Bitwarden’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Save all your passwords across devices and the web,
- Generate strong passwords to strengthen your privacy,
- Store all types of sensitive data within your Bitwarden Vault and share it securely to other people, and
- Use vault health reports to identify weak or reused passwords.
With Bitwarden, you won’t have to worry about forgetting your passwords.
Although you probably save all your passwords on your Google account, it may happen that you forget your Google account password. And that’s when complications start.
A similar situation happened to me, which is why I decided to try Bitwarden. With it, I can now store all my passwords in Bitwarden’s vault and access them at any time.
One of my favorite Bitwarden’s options is its “Generator” option. It allows me to generate strong and unique passwords for any of my accounts.
![Bitwarden generator](jpg/bitwarden-generator.jpg)
I can choose the type of password (password or passphrase), the length of the password, and what kind of characters I want to include in it.
In addition, Bitwarden also has the ability of generating a username.
To generate a strong username, I just have to click on the “Username” option and choose a username type (it can be a random word, for example). Additionally, I can also choose whether I want to capitalize my username or include numbers in it.
Bitwarden’s pros
These are some of the Bitwarden’s benefits:
- It offers the option to unlock your vault via PIN or biometrics,
- It helps you generate strong passwords and usernames to reduce the chances of data breach, and
- It allows you to save all your passwords across devices and the web and have them all in one place.
Bitwarden’s cons
Here are some of the downsides of using Bitwarden:
- It lacks phone support,
- Some additional options like Bitwarden Authenticator or security reports are only available in the paid plans, and
- To be able to share passwords with other people, you have to create “organizations” (an “organization” is a shared vault that is separated from your personal vault).
What’s new in Bitwarden
On November 7th 2023, Bitwarden launched a new passkey management feature to enable their users to log in to websites in a more convenient way. Users can now create and store passkeys in their vaults for quick and secure passwordless logins.
Managing passkeys is only available for Bitwarden’s web extensions.
In addition to the Firefox extension, Bitwarden also offers some other platforms.
Type of plan and availability | Bitwarden pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | Yes |
Cheapest paid plan | Less than $1/month/user but $10 when billed annually (for personal use) (whether it’s billed monthly or annually depends on the type of subscription) |
Availability | Android, iOS, Web (Web app and Google Chrome, Safari, Vivaldi, Opera, Brave, Microsoft Edge, DuckDuckGo for Mac, and Top Browser extensions), Mac, Windows, Linux |
FireShot — best for capturing screenshots
![FireShot screenshot](jpg/fireshot-screenshot.jpg)
FireShot is a screen capture tool that allows you to effortlessly take a screenshot of a specific web page, capture all open tabs, and much more.
Why is FireShot best for capturing screenshots?
If you need an efficient way to take screenshots, FireShot will surely be of help.
With FireShot’s Firefox extension, you can:
- Capture the entire web page or just a visible part of it,
- Take screenshots of all open tabs in your browser,
- Select a specific part of the web page that you want to capture and take a screenshot of that part, and
- Save screenshots as JPG or PNG images or as a PDF file.
I like using FireShot for my work as it has a lot of useful capturing options. For example, it allows me to capture a specific part of a web page and later include that screenshot in an article or blog post that I’m writing.
![FireShot capture selection option](png/fireshot-capture-selection-option.png)
FireShot is a versatile screen capture tool compared to some other similar tools. Apart from offering several capturing options, FireShot also allows its users to add watermarks on screenshots or customize page size.
However, some of these options, such as watermarks and page customization options, are only available in the FireShot Pro version.
FireShot’s pros
To see some of FireShot’s advantages, take a look at the list below:
- It offers several capturing options such as capturing the entire page, visible part of the page, selected part of the page, and more,
- It provides you with the ability to save screenshots as JPG or PNG images or as a PDF file, and
- It has the “Capture list of URLs…” option to add a list of URLs of the web pages that you want to take screenshots of.
FireShot’s cons
These are some of the main disadvantages of using FireShot:
- For more advanced options, you’ll need to switch to FireShot Pro version (which is a paid version),
- It would be nice if it had the option of video recording, and
- It only offers a forum for support (you only get access to the Premium section on their support forum and priority email support if you purchase a FireShot Pro Lifetime license).
What’s new in FireShot
On June 5th, 2023, FireShot released its latest updates that include some new options for their users.
These updates include the “Capture list of URLs…” option, additional info in PDFs such as page title, source link, and creation time, and more.
Besides the Firefox extension, FireShot is also available as an extension for many other web browsers.
Type of plan and availability | FireShot pricing and platforms |
---|---|
Free plan | Yes |
Free trial | Yes |
Cheapest paid plan | It offers a FireShot Pro Lifetime license (a one-time payment) that you can purchase for $59.95/unit |
Availability | Web (Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Internet Explorer, Tor, Opera, Brave, Seamonkey, Pale Moon, Yandex, Vivaldi, and other browsers based on the Chromium platform or Mozilla products) |
FAQs about Firefox extensions
To learn more about Firefox extensions — like whether there are any safety issues, how to use them, and more — pay attention to the following section of this blog post.
Are Firefox extensions safe?
Although most Firefox extensions are safe, some of them may pose certain security risks.
To provide their users with extensions that meet the highest security standards, Mozilla Firefox has introduced the “Recommended Extensions program” — a list of extensions that are approved by their security experts.
In other words, if an extension has a “Recommended” status, it means that it has been thoroughly reviewed by Firefox’s security team and is safe to download.
However, it’s important to note that if a particular extension doesn’t have a “Recommended” status, it does not necessarily mean that it is unsafe. It only means that the extension hasn’t been verified by their security experts.
To increase your chances of downloading a safe Firefox extension, you should either:
- Download the extension with a “Recommended” status from the Mozilla Add-ons for Firefox website, or
- Download the extension from its official website.
Can Firefox browser extensions be hacked?
The short answer is — yes, Firefox browser extensions can be hacked.
As we learned from the previous subheading, there is always a potential security risk when downloading an extension.
According to research on vulnerable and malicious browser extensions, cyber-attacks have the goal of “penetrating into the victims’ computers by taking advantage of vulnerabilities exposed by their browsers or installed browser extensions.”
The same research also states that these attacks are “on a continuous rise,” which means that you should definitely be careful when downloading a Firefox extension (or any other extension for that matter).
Do Firefox browser extensions track you?
Generally, Firefox extensions can track your activities and access your data but only if you give them appropriate permissions.
These permissions inform you whether a certain extension may:
- Access your data for the websites you visit,
- Read and modify your browser settings or browser’s download history,
- Open files downloaded to your computer,
- Access your location, and much more.
Therefore, it is crucial that you carefully read a list of permissions for each extension you intend to add to your browser before you add it.
How to add extensions to Firefox?
To add extensions to Firefox, go to Mozilla Add-ons for Firefox website. Then, use its search engine to find the extension you want to add to your browser.
When you click on that particular extension, a new page will open where you’ll be able to find the blue “Add to Firefox” button.
After you click the “Add to Firefox” button, a window will open, informing you which permissions you need to grant if you want to install the extension.
If you agree with those permissions, click the “Add” option, and the extension will be automatically added to your browser.
How to use Chrome extensions on Firefox?
To import Google Chrome extensions into Firefox, you can use the “Import Browser Data” option in the Firefox browser’s settings.
When you click the “Import Data” button and check the Extensions box from the list, you’ll see how many matching extensions Firefox is able to import from your Google Chrome browser.
In other words, Firefox will automatically find its native add-on versions of the extensions you have installed on your Chrome browser. After that, it will add those add-ons to your Firefox browser.
Finally, to complete the installation of add-ons, click on the “Install Extensions” notification.
How to remove extensions in Firefox?
First, you need to go to your Add-ons Manager page. There, you’ll see all the extensions you have installed in your browser.
To remove a specific extension, click on the three dots icon. Once you do that, a drop down menu will open where you can choose the “Remove” option.
When you click on the “Remove” option, a window will open asking if you are sure you want to remove the extension in question.
To confirm that you’re sure, click the “Remove” option and your extension will be automatically removed from your browser.
Closing words: When used cautiously, Firefox extensions can make your life a whole lot easier
One of the best things that comes with using the Firefox browser is the ability to add extensions to it. They can improve your browsing experience and help you work more efficiently.
However, with so many extensions available, you may have had a hard time choosing the extension that would be most helpful to you.
In addition, you also may have had concerns about how secure Firefox extensions actually are.
After reading this blog post, we hope we’ve helped you learn more about the security risks associated with Firefox extensions and how to reduce them.
Furthermore, we hope our list of Firefox extensions has helped you choose the perfect extension that satisfies your needs.
✉️ If you like our selection of Firefox extensions, we’d appreciate it if we could get some feedback from you about the extensions you use on a daily basis. Let us know at blogfeedback@clockify.me and we may include your choices in our future posts. And if you liked this blog post, share it with someone you think could benefit from